


what the water gave me

by mollykaths



Series: once more, with feeling [1]
Category: Rogue One: A Star Wars Story (2016), Star Wars - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Everyone Lives/Nobody Dies, Angst with a Happy Ending, F/M, First Kiss, Pining, Romance, Slow Burn, lots of awkward silence and nodding lmao, sorry if this is too sappy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-10
Updated: 2017-08-10
Packaged: 2018-12-13 04:04:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,748
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11751636
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mollykaths/pseuds/mollykaths
Summary: Beautiful, Jyn recalls, is the tiny ghost of a smile that Cassian shared when he saw Jyn unharmed.





	what the water gave me

**Author's Note:**

> First oneshot for this new rebelcaptain series I'm working on because Rogue One is still ruining my life, like, 9 months later.

 

Perched on a stool next to his bed, Jyn watches the rise and fall of Cassian's chest as he sleeps. A dull throb persists in her temple, all of Jyn’s thoughts running slow and sluggish like honey. Nonetheless, she’s as alert as she can be. Jyn had been drifting in and out of consciousness since the doctors removed her from the bacta tank but she’s focused now, the low humming of machinery generating a beat as she watches each delicate intake of air that Cassian takes.

 

Before, when Jyn had just been pulling herself out of her drug induced haze, she vaguely remembers that she had reached for Cassian’s hand. The skies of Scarif had lit up, hollowing out to engulf them. A tight embrace, a shaky hand pulling her close; those were the crowning recollections that Jyn could piece together as she came to in the medbay.

 

“ _I’m glad you came_ ,” were Jyn’s last words to him.

 

The faith that had shouldered him was still present, an uncanny and hopeful glow that danced across his features like shadows left behind from the man-made sunset. Around the edges, crinkling pleasantly against the creases of his eyes as they bore into her own; Jyn doesn’t forget the way Cassian had spoken to her without moving his lips.

 

Beside her, Cassian stirs and Jyn impulsively reaches forward to wrap her hand around his. This time, she marvels in the heat it radiates. Warm and solid beneath her touch, Cassian is nothing like her father during the final moments he had clung to: frail, broken, and yielding.

 

“Hey.” Cassian mumbles so hoarse and soft, Jyn almost doesn't hear it. It leaves her a good enough excuse to stow away the memory of her father, her attention refocused on the man slowly phasing into reality.

 

“You’re awake,” Jyn greets.

 

“You’re here,” Cassian returns, his words slurred from intoxication. His lids droop from sleep and medication, eyes unfocused as he clearly struggles to keep them open. This isn’t their first meeting since leaving their bacta tanks. Jyn just happened to wake up before him and Cassian had a ways to go until he  reached her wellness. Still, this was the most coherent she had seen him since their arrival to the medbay.  


 

“Of course.”

 

Thankfully, Cassian isn’t sober so Jyn doesn’t fret over what to say next,removing the very possible outcome where she makes a fool of herself. As her thumb strokes the callous lines of his palm, Jyn carefully asses his features. Any remaining injuries- like his battered nose and lip- have cleared up, significantly.

 

“Your hair,” Cassian pipes up, using his free hand to point. “You’re wearing it down.”

 

“I hadn’t noticed,” Jyn admits. It’s not like she’s had the opportunity to maintain her appearance.

 

“It’s long.”

 

Jyn permits herself to grin. One thing to look forward to later is being able to tease Cassian about his brilliant deductions.

 

“What’s so funny?” Cassian asks, indignant, yet only furrowing his brows as lightly as possible, still careful to avoid tension.

 

“Nothing,” Jyn replies, her face hurting from the upwards stretch of her mouth. She had forgotten how good this could feel (or that she could feel it at all.)

 

Cassian, groaning from the effort of stretching his sedated limbs, weakly unfolds his arm to tug gently at Jyn’s hair. Not at all prepared, Jyn’s first instinct is to wretch herself away from his caress. Guilt immediately slips inside the peaceful wake of her mind. Biting down caution, Jyn dips her head nearer so Cassian doesn’t have to strain. Ribbons of fine silk curl around his fingers, Cassian’s once tired eyes now incandescent with fascination.

 

“Feels soft, like a loth-kitten’s fur,” Cassian murmurs, bidding her a drunken and sheepish smile.

 

“Does it, now?” Jyn ribs him, gently.

 

Cassian meekly grazes his fingertips over her cheek. There’s a heavy silence, filled only with the sound of exhales between them. Embarrassment should have found her by now but Jyn leans into his warmth instead, wanting to pour into him her own affection, every last bit of herself that she has to spare.

 

“Look at you,” Cassianmumbles, staring at Jyn intently. His voice breaks on the following syllables.“You’re so beautiful.”

 

He speaks in such awe, as if he were a small boy witnessing the beaches of Lah’mu for the first time, drinking in the planet’s daunting cliffs and sand dunes shimmering of crystal. Cassian’s words dizzy her in the same way climbing the mighty Citadel tower on Scarif had: if she dives back down, she could lose herself.‘ _Beautiful_ ‘ steals the breath from Jyn’s lungs and she nearly reels out of her chair.

 

“I should go,” Jyn says suddenly, standing upright in one swift jolt,smoothing the rough fabric of her hospital slacks. Her heartbeat is untraceable, skyrocketing out of her chest and into orbit. Already missing Cassian’s skin on hers, Jyn signals her departure with a curt nod, scuttling to the exit. The dejected sound that Cassian utters is no different from the whine of a nerf calf, unable to spot it’s mother among the herd.

 

“The droids will notice that I snuck out,” Jyn continues, not entirely dishonest. “Give it some time and I’m sure they’ll find a way to chain me to the bed.”

 

Cassian snorts. “You’d still find a way. I don’t doubt it.”

 

The fondness in his voice sears through her like a blaster bullet to the gut. He’s deserving of so much more. Jyn turns and looks at him from across the room, faltering momentarily before saying, softly, “We’ll see each other soon.”

 

She leaves, consumed in thought, trying and failing to ignore the intimacy that had breezed past them.Jyn doesn’t trust herself with unpacking everything between them, nor does she know when this all started; maybe in the hangar, when Cassian pledged himself to her. Perhaps it began in the lift, after she had given him conviction, a crutch that he had used to steer himself onwards. 

 

Even the brief walk from Cassian’s room to her own left her winded and nauseated. Luckily, sleep finds her soon enough. Her dreams hold her, one after the other, a stream of images that bore her along like an ocean's current. Behind her eyelids, Jyn sees Lah’mu. Cassian is there, too, matching her stride as they walk along the shore.

 

Jyn entered Scarif knowing she would leave a home behind so it never occurred to her that she’d need to start from scratch. The cramped barracks occupying the Alliance headquarters aren't ideal but it's something, enough to keep her anchored. A week later (or was it two? Jyn is still learning how to keep track of time) she makes the tiny room feel lived in, like she had been there for much longer, despite having absolutely nothing to dress it with. After all, the Alliance couldn’t discharge her from medbay with no plan. She understood that, even welcomed the small distraction. 

 

Anything to keep her mind off the Death Star, the rebels, and her place within the movement— although, visits from Bodhi, Chirrut, and Baze certainly help alleviate her trepidation. Even K-2SO, Cassian’s snide and aloof droid companion, was beginning to grow on her a bit (not that she’d admit that out loud.) K-2SO had come to visit her, quipping about her survival among all odds. Jyn was quick to jest, “Are you here because Cassian told you to come? Or are you going soft on me?”

 

Jyn was pleased to have made the droid speechless, even if it was for only a moment.

 

Cassian does make his way back to her, just not the way Jyn would’ve expected. She wasn’t sure either of them would succeed in taking the first step, assumed that the next time they crossed paths, it’d be the result of a new assignment. That would be in the forefront of their minds, Jyn had decided. It’d go back to the two of them, wordlessly moving forward, neither taking the time to talk about what they had or what had happened. There’s a knock on her door that jostles Jyn out of her thoughts. She had folding clothes, placing them in her dresser, feeling fairly productive.

 

“Hey,” Cassian greets when he slides the tiled frame open with a resounding click.

 

The gloom flees from her breath as she lets out the tiniest sigh of relief.

 

“You’re back.”

 

“Most of us are,” Cassian says with a nod. He steps inside, closing the gap of space between them.

 

“Have you heard from the others?” Jyn asks.

 

Cassian opens his mouth, closes it and clears his throat, walking past Jyn to sit on her bunk. He looks good: tidied up, hair combed, beard trimmed, not nearly as skinny as he was the last time Jyn saw him. That fluttering of her heart begins to stir at the sight of him so casually falling back into place, as though no time had passed between them.

 

“Yeah.”

 

For a long moment, neither speak. She’s aching from the discomfort of knowing something that she probably shouldn’t.Jyn isn’t even sure where they’d begin; isn’t sure if it would be worth mentioning at all. Once she brings up  _that moment_ , everything else becomes harder to ignore: the home they had given one another, the embrace on the beach, the promises.

 

He’d called her beautiful. Cassian didn’t know what beautiful really was. Beautiful was the terrifying, orange glow on the shores of Scarif. Beautiful was Cassian Andor, emerging from clouds of smoke and firing into the back of Director Orson Krennic, the man who had taken everything from her. Beautiful was the loud crack of gunfire and the sound of the wretched, limp body collapsing onto the ground, inches from where she stood.

 

Beautiful, Jyn recalls, is the tiny ghost of a smile that Cassian shared when he saw Jyn unharmed.

 

“Cassian— “ Jyn begins. Simultaneously, Cassian parts his mouth to speak again, then shuts it immediately, red all over.

 

“Jyn,” Cassian splutters after a moment, fingers curling under her bed frame as he ducks his head in shame.

 

“I don’t know what to do with myself now that I’m really here,” she admits, offering him a jaded look. She had gradually stopped shuffling awkwardly to sit beside him. Cassian didn’t even so much as blink at the dip of weight.

 

“Neither do I,” Cassian agrees. He’s not looking at her, still staring down, but Jyn can see the line of a rueful grin threatening to show. It disappears just as quickly.

 

Jyn nods, aching to fill the distance between them. They were so close and Jyn could reach for his hand like she had before, it wouldn’t be so wrong. Maybe he’d even smile at her like he had then; a wordless gesture that told her everything she needed to hear when neither could spare the moment to cry out. Jyn wasn’t ready to forget the peace it had brought her.

 

Their knees bump together when Cassian shifts, uncomfortably. The hair rises along Jyn’s arms and the back of her neck, prickling almost painfully. Sensing Jyn’s distress, Cassian looks up, studying her for a moment before placing a hand on her back, and suggests, “I suppose we keep doing what we always do. But it can be different, this time.”

 

Despite the lack of tenacity in his touch, electricity spears though her, scorching her, drying Jyn’s lips and throat. She knows what Cassian means when he says it's different; she doesn’t want him to explain why but at the same time,  _they have to talk about it_.

 

“Cassian,” Jyn starts. “There’s something I need to tell you.”

 

The galaxy had shrunk so abruptly from something so vast and overwhelming to the sphere encasing them in this tiny, unimpressive room with an eerie chill that began to settle. All Jyn could think about was the support of Cassian’s palm on her back grow firm, more insistent due to the drop in her voice.

 

“What’s wrong?”

 

With a sharp nudge in her throat, Jyn explains, “I visited you while you were still drugged. You touched my hair and you, um…you told me I was beautiful.”

 

 _You also compared me to a loth-kitten_ , Jyn was going to add but the revelation was already too alarming. Jyn sees the way her words snap his spine upright, like the crack of a whip. Cassian tenses, tearing his hand away from her, tightening his jaw. When the entirety of his expression comes into focus, Jyn estimates that there’s enough blood rushing to his head to warrant some kind of fever.

 

“ _Jyn_ ,” He chokes, covering his face with his hands. “I’m so sorry.”

 

“It’s alright,” Jyn reassures. “You were delirious. I’m sure you were saying all kinds of things you didn’t mean.”

 

“You know I meant it,” Cassian groans, peering at her through his fingers. “I just wasn’t ready to tell you that.”

 

“I’m sorry I had to find out this way,” Jyn says, bidding him a sympathetic look that she isn't sure he’ll find helpful.

 

“Jyn,” Cassian sighs, long and wearily, “if I hurt you—“

 

“You didn’t,” Jyn interrupts. “But it did scare me.”

 

“Is that why you stopped visiting me?”

 

Jyn hangs her head in reproach.  
 

 

"You noticed?"  
 

 

“Kay told me,” Cassian says, massaging his temple. 

 

 

_Of course he would._

 

“I hadn’t heard someone tell me that in such a long time. I thought—“

 

She hears the rustle of sheets as Cassian inches closer, worried by the crack in her tenor. He doesn’t stop her and Jyn is thankful for that.

 

“—I didn’t know what to think but I shouldn’t have left you like that.”

 

A small part of Jyn thinks she has it in her to cry but at this point, her tears have been spent. Loss had hardened her. Instead, Jyn deflates, collapsing into herself, chin stuck to her chest. 

 

“Do you trust me?” Cassians asks her, delicately.

 

Again, Jyn nods because that’s still easier than speaking. She spots the length of Cassian’s arm out of the corner of her eye and it’s enough to direct her gaze back to his. There’s a faint smile on Cassian’s lips as he tentatively reaches out to cup the side of her face.

 

“This isn’t how I wanted to start,” Cassian confesses, brushing his thumb along her cheekbone.

 

“But you did want to,” Jyn manages, swallowing the thick lump in her throat. “Start, I mean.”

 

“I do,” Cassian corrects her.

 

“ _You really meant it_ ,” Jyn says, more to herself than to him, not wholly trusting the bubbly, foreign knot of excitement emanating from deep within her. Regardless, Jyn gives in, letting herself break just a bit by folding her own hand over Cassian’s, maintaining his grip. She closes her eyes, struggling against the sudden urge to crush her weight into his and kiss him like she’ll stop breathing if she doesn’t. She hears him inhale sharply, the sound thrilling and familiar.

 

When Jyn’s eyes snap open, Cassian is still there. Jyn wants to trap her tongue in his mouth, between those open teeth, and spill her mended spirit into him upon every gasp.

 

“Your smile, especially,” Cassian notes, thumb grazing the corner of her mouth. Jyn hadn’t acknowledged that she was smiling.

 

The first kiss they share is a doting one. Jyn brings Cassian's hand to her mouth to softly press her lips against his knuckles. The second kiss is one that leaves Jyn dazed, breathing hard into Cassian’s open mouth. It wasn’t anything more than a mellow sigh, but the noise Cassian makes when she nips at his lower lip is disorienting. She wants to hear it again; wants to make it _permanent_.

 

There’s a chance that they might all live to see an end to the Empire. Jyn might find solace, someday, when she no longer has to fight and she has the luxury of feeling hot sand graze her ankles, the sun glaring into the crown of her head.

 

She might see the skies of Lah’mu and Cassian could be there, blinking into the sunlight with her, listening to the waves and the sigh of the wind hissing through tall blades of grass. The thought of not truly knowing what lies ahead both terrifies Jyn and sets her free. She’s floating now, buoyed up by the faith they’ve never truly stopped holding on to and Jyn thinks she might be able to put this reoccurring and intangible dream into words.

 

 

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> This is pretty sappy and maybe indulgent and tbh I was not going to make this a first kiss fic at first. At some point I was like....wait. This is fanfiction. I can do whatever I want and serve my own selfish need to see Jyn and Cassian smooch. Let me live!!!!!


End file.
